


After Dark

by Miya_Morana



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Gore, Horror, M/M, Zombies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-26
Updated: 2012-10-26
Packaged: 2017-11-17 01:51:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/546326
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miya_Morana/pseuds/Miya_Morana
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles has been trying hard to stay out of werewolf business. Even when he stumbles upon the dead body of a neighbor, he lets the cops and Derek's pack take care of things. But fate doesn't care that he wants nothing to do with the supernatural, it would seem, and Stiles is going to end up in the middle a zombie crisis whether he wants it or not.</p>
            </blockquote>





	After Dark

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Spook Me horror ficathon. Also, thanks to for being an awesome and enthusiastic alpha-reader.

Stiles had been good at staying out of werewolf business. Of course, Scott shares with him the updates Isaac gives him on what’s going on with Derek’s pack, because knowledge is important, and this way Stiles could make sure to stay out of the Alpha pack’s way when that whole mess was going on. But all in all Stiles hasn’t been mixed up in anything shady since the summer started, and he likes it that way. It’s been months since the last time his dad found him at a crime scene, and their relationship is slowly getting better.

He should have known it wouldn’t last.

It’s really not his fault if he’s the one to find the body. He isn’t roaming the woods, he hasn’t sneaked out to investigate one of his dad’s calls on his own, and it’s five to midnight so technically he’s not even breaking his Cinderella curfew yet. He’s walking home from Scott’s, where they spent the evening playing Mario Kart (because throwing turtles and banana skins at each other is as violent as they were willing to get tonight).

They live less than ten minutes away from each other and it’s a quiet neighborhood. But Stiles has spent too much time around werewolves not to recognize the pungent smell of blood when he passes in front of Mrs Griffin’s yard.

Stiles stops, turns his head toward the darkened lawn. There’s something under the old apple tree, something a little bit too big to be an animal, he thinks, but the shape is wrong for a human being. Taking a shaky breath, Stiles digs his phone out of his pocket and switches it on to use the screen as a torchlight.

He really wishes he hadn’t, wishes he had just walked home. The grass looks brown in the blue-ish light of the phone, but Stiles can guess that it’s actually a dark red. It’s covered in blood and... _things_ that his brain helpfully identifies as entrails and bits of skin and muscles. The body has been torn, and Stiles is pretty sure that the bits and pieces of gore scattered around don’t make up for what’s missing. 

When Stiles’s phone lights the back of a head, cracked open, covered in blood and looking strangely _empty_ , Stiles feels an acrid bile rise to his throat. He still has the lucidity to stagger as far as possible from the bloody mess before he throws up, vaguely thinking that normal people probably don’t have the reflex to try to preserve a crime scene when they stumble upon that kind of thing.

He’s regretting every bite of pizza he’s had earlier as the acidity of tomato burns his throat on its way out. Once he’s sure he’s finished vomiting, he wipes his mouth on the sleeve of his flannel shirt and looks at the phone he’s still clutching in his hand. He wonders if he should call Derek, because clearly nothing human did _that_... Please tell him nothing human did that? But there’s too much of a mess for Derek to be able to make it all disappear anyway, so he finds himself flipping through his contacts to find the number of the Beacon Hills police station.

Nancy picks up. Stiles likes Nancy, he’s known her for most of his life. She’s one of the few cops left from before Matt. He babbles, he knows he does, but somehow he manages to make her understand that no, he’s not calling just to check that his father isn’t cheating on his diet but because there’s a dead body in Mrs Griffin’s yard. She keeps him on the phone and talking until the police cars arrive.

Stiles’s dad bolts out of his car and Stiles wraps his arms around his shoulders, clinging onto him for a little while as he fights back the panic attack trying to claw its way out. When he finally lets go, the cops are already cording off the area and the ME is carefully circling the body while photos are taken, waiting to be given the green light to go examine the remains.

In the bright light of the police cars and the porch, Stiles can see what’s left of a flowery blue dress. The one Mrs Griffin had been wearing when she waved at him this afternoon. She used to let Scott and him play in her yard and steal her apples when they were kids. She even gave them cookies sometimes. And now there’s a chewed-up arm hanging from a low branch.

Stiles thought his stomach was empty, but he was wrong. His dad gently rubs his back until he’s finished throwing up again.

“Stiles? Stiles!” he hears Scott call, and off course he would have heard the sirens.

Stiles looks up to see his best friend being told to stay behind the yellow cord, and he makes a vague hand gesture in his direction to tell him he’s fine. It seems to work, because Scott just waits anxiously where he is instead of running around the cop.

“Why don’t you go home with Scott,” his dad suggests. “I can take you to the station for your statement tomorrow. There’s no reason for you to have to stay here tonight.”

“Yeah,” Stiles breathes out. “Yeah, I’ll do that. Thanks.”

His dad squeezes his shoulder, and Stiles gives him a shaky smile before joining Scott.

“Hey, are you okay?” Scott asks him, wrapping his arms around him, because Scott is an awesome friend.

“Nope,” Stiles admits quietly. “That’s Mrs Griffin.”

“Oh my God...” Scott’s arms tighten around him for a couple of seconds before he lets him go. “What happened?”

“No idea,” Stiles sighs. “I just found her.” Then, lower, “Can you smell werewolf?”

“Dude, all I can smell is blood and death,” Scott says, low and whimpery.

“You and me both. Let’s get out of here.”

Scott ends up texting his mom and crashing at Stiles’s. They haven’t slept in the same bed since Scott turned twelve and declared it was weird, but they do tonight. Scott takes up too much space in the bed, and he snores softly after he falls asleep. Stiles spends a few hours looking at the ceiling, afraid to close his eyes.

He’s seen a lot of gruesome things in the last year. Laura’s body, cut in half and covered in dirt. Peter’s burnt flesh when they killed him outside of Derek’s house. Okay, when they almost killed him and Derek finished the job. Lydia, mauled on the Lacrosse field with Peter looming over her broken body. The police station, when Matt went on his killing spree. But nothing had look as bad as this.

Scott grunts in his sleep and shifts under the covers, throwing his arm on Stiles’s chest.

“Dude, I’m not Allison,” he complains.

“Shut up and sleep,” Scott mumbles, eyes still closed.

Stiles isn’t sure if Scott’s awake or not, but he tries to breathe on time with his best friend, and eventually drifts into sleep after he hears his dad come home.

***

Stiles plays with the food on his plate, but he can’t eat much. Next to him, Scott wolfs down -ha!- his breakfast while his dad sips on a cup of coffee. He looks as tired as Stiles feels.

Stiles gives up on his pancakes and checks his phone. He texted Derek earlier to let him know about what he thinks is probably a very vicious werewolf attack, but Derek hasn’t replied yet. He could at least send him a “okay, I’m on it” or a “thanks for the info”. Is that too much to ask, really? Derek fails so hard at communication.

They drop Scott off at his house on the way to the police station. The rest of the drive is spent in silence. His statement is short and to the point. There’s not much to say. He was walking home, noticed the smell and the dark shape under the tree. Got a look at it, threw up, called the station. At least he hadn’t passed out. Hey, maybe he _could_ have sawed off Derek’s arm if he had had to!

Thinking about a chopped-off arm reminds him of the one that was hanging from the tree, and he fights a wave of nausea. When he’s done with all the formalities, he goes home. Plays video games all day. Tries not to think about it.

***

It’s been a couple of days, and he still has no news from Derek, so he calls him. The Alpha picks up after the fourteenth ring.

“What do you want?”

Derek’s voice is irritated and aggressive. Nothing out of the ordinary, then.

“Did you catch the rogue werewolf who killed Mrs Griffin?” Stiles asks, because why bother with small talk, Derek doesn’t believe in small talk anyway.

There’s a sigh on the other end of the line. “No.”

“What do you mean, no?” Stiles replies, feeling his heartbeat pick up. “There’s still a vicious werewolf killer roaming the streets of Beacon Hills? Besides your uncle I mean.”

“It wasn’t a werewolf, Stiles.”

“Of course it was! She was _eaten_ , Derek!”

“I know.” Derek sounds a little bit shaky, which is almost scary. “I went to the morgue, trying to pick up a scent. Stiles, all of the bite marks were human.”

Stiles doesn’t know how it happens, but all of a sudden he’s sitting on the floor, clutching his phone to his ear. Derek is calling his name, and it takes him a moment to find his voice again.

“Oh God...” he breathes out.

“Yeah...” comes Derek’s reply. “Anyway, I figured we should let the cops handle this one.”

“Yes, right. Right.”

***

The media take a hold of the story after the second body is found on a construction site, actually not that far from were Stiles stumbled on the first one. Stiles had been trying to forget about everything, to let his dad and the rest of the police department do their job and catch the cannibalistic nutjob, but somehow details of the case where leaked, including the fact that the local sheriff’s son had found the first victim. So now there are reporters knocking on his door, asking for juicy details, and Stiles doesn’t know how to get rid of them.

However, that’s not what worries him the most right now. No, what worries him is another fact that got leaked to the media, that he’s sure his dad would have carefully kept from Stiles if he had been able to. The second victim hadn’t been as badly eaten up than Mrs Griffin, but his skull was cracked open too, the brain missing.

Even before, Stiles would have jumped to the same conclusion, but now that he knows for sure there _are_ such things as werewolves and magic and lizard monsters, well no one can blame him for deciding they have a zombie problem on their hands. Or at least that’s what he thinks, up until Scott bursts out laughing when he Skypes him.

“Dude, I’m serious,” he groans, eliciting a new fit of laughter from his best friend. “Really, that’s the way you react? We could be on the verge of a zombie apocalypse and you want to be one of these people who try to rationalize everything, which leads them to their imminent death?”

“Stiles, we’re not in a movie,” Scott chuckles. “Calm down, man.” He sobers up before continuing. “Listen, I know the whole thing is just horrible, but this isn’t the way to deal with that.”

“I can’t believe you!” Stiles shouts. “Have you seen our lives? We _are_ living in a horror movie!”

“Of course we are,” Scott replies, patronizingly, and then looks down as his phone buzzes. “Sorry man, gotta take this. Allison. See you tomorrow?”

Stiles groans a vague reply and Scott ends the call. Him and Allison aren’t quite back together yet, but it’s close enough for Scott to be completely obsessed with her again. Granted, their epic puppy love is adorable when one of them isn’t trying to kill the other, but Stiles still thinks that zombies should take priority over romance. Teenagers, these days, no common sense at all.

Stiles looks at his own phone, wondering if he should call Derek. The Alpha grew up with the supernatural, he would know if zombies existed, right? The worst thing that could happen would be Derek hanging up on him, and compared to the possible threat of zombies in his neighborhood, well, Stiles is ready to take the risk. He dials the number.

Derek doesn’t hang up on him. He doesn’t laugh. He does growls at Stiles to stay out of it, and Stiles is more than happy to, as long as Derek assures him he’ll really look into it. Reassured that the local werewolves are going to prevent a zombie plague outbreak, Stiles can go back to his normal life, one without dead bodies and life-threatening situations, thank you very much. And to think there was a time when he _deliberately_ went out looking for trouble.

***

Some kind of higher power somewhere must be really pissed off at him, or else it just enjoys making Stiles’s life a nightmare. He’s been avoiding going out alone at night, taking the jeep even just to drop by at Scott’s. He know Derek and his pack have been patrolling the neighborhood, because Scott complains constantly about their scents being all over the place. If life was fair, Stiles shouldn’t be staring at a zombie chewing on some guy’s intestines in the video-store's parking lot.

The stench of fresh blood and rotten flesh is nauseating, and so are the sounds of human teeth tearing at raw flesh. It’s definitely a zombie: half of her face is falling off where someone or something clawed at it, her left arm is limp along her side and hanging slightly too low, as if the shoulder has been broken, and her skin, where it’s not covered in dried or fresh blood, is the distinguishable grey of death.

She hasn’t noticed Stiles yet, too busy burying her face in her victim’s belly and ripping organs with her teeth, blood and other things splashing everywhere. He’s only about fifty feet from his jeep, but he doesn’t dare move a muscle, in case it might attract her attention. The guy’s body jerks every time she digs into him. His skull has been cracked open and emptied, and the one eye that’s still in its orbit stares at Stiles.

Stiles startles when a spray of blood spurts in his direction, taking a step back without even thinking. He puts his foot on _something_ , maybe a shard of glass, he doesn’t know, doesn’t care beyond the fact that it screeches under his shoe. The zombie lifts her head, slowly. Stiles swallows.

The instant he sees her start to get on her feet, he bolts in the direction of his jeep. He knows he shouldn’t look back, but he does anyway, and she’s shuffle-running after him faster than her twisted ankle should allow her to. Stiles swears, tries to dig his car key out of his jeans pocket while he runs, nearly drops them when he reaches the jeep. 

He fumbles with the lock, plunges on the driver seat and shouts when cold, tacky fingers wrap around his wrist. He tugs, but she’s strong, too strong for her slender body. Her slender, _dead_ body. Stiles twists in the seat, ignoring the agonizing pain shouting through his forearm, and kicks her in the face. There’s the sound of soft facial bones being crushed, and the hold on his wrist is released.

Stiles slams his door shut and puts the key in the ignition. The jeep grinds as he floors the pedal and gets the hell out of there. He drives straight ahead for a few minutes, terror overriding his brain. He’s gripping the wheel like it’s the only thing keeping him alive, even though it’s making the pain in his arm so much worse.

When the panic recedes enough for him to start thinking again, he slows down to the speed limit, thanking whatever divinity might have taken pity on him that none of his dad’s men caught him doing 50 mph in a 30 area. Then he calls Derek, because what else can he do?

“What?” Derek gowls in his ear, and Stiles clings to the normalcy of it, his fingers tightening around his cellphone.

“So, I found the zombie.” He would be proud of how not-freaked-out his voice sounds if he wasn’t still on the edge of hysteria.

“Stiles, for the love of... I told you to leave this to us!”

“I know,” Stiles replies, and yup, he can hear the that high-pitched panic note in his voice now. “It’s not my fault, I just stumbled on her!”

Derek sighs on the other end of the line, a sound of deep frustration. Stiles doesn’t really care if the werewolf doesn’t believe him right now though.

“She was in the parking lot of the video-store on 5th, she must still be around.”

“Okay,” Derek grunts. “Stay away from there, we got this.”

Stiles nods, even if it’s stupid since Derek can’t see him. He has no intention of going back anywhere near Dead Chick.

“Derek?” he says before the werewolf can hang up on him.

“What?”

Stiles takes a deep breath.

“She bit me.”

Stiles has heard Derek use some pretty inventive and disturbing metaphors and threats to express his feelings, but he has never _ever_ heard him properly swear. Until now.

Looking at the torn flesh on his forearm, Stiles can only echo the sentiment. It doesn’t look all round and human-bite-mark-y, like it does on television, almost neat. Instead, it’s all jagged and messy, covered in blood that’s dripping down over Stiles’s thigh and the seat, and probably the floor too.

“Where are you?” Derek asks him after a heavy pause.

“On the 7th, I think,” Stiles replies, squinting at the dark streets. “Yeah, the 7th, heading East.”

“I’ll send the pack to take care of things at the video-store. Meet me at the school.”

Derek hangs up before Stiles can say anything, because that’s the way Derek rolls. No “hello” when he picks up, no “good bye” when he ends the call. One day, Stiles will sit down with him and teach him about politeness and social conventions, even if it goes slightly against his ‘no mangling in the business of werewolves’ police. For all the good it’s gotten him, anyway.

The school parking lot looks empty when Stiles arrives, but as he slows down he can see Derek step out of the shadows. Stiles parks in front of him and gets out of the car, plainly aware that his heart is still beating too fast and that Derek can hear it. He barely has the time to register the smell of rotten meat and the way Derek is suddenly wolfing out when something grabs his ankle.

He falls face down against the pavement, can feel his nose break as it smashes on the hard surface. When he looks back, the zombie is clinging to his jeans, crawling along his leg. Her own legs are missing, he realizes. She must have hold on to his car and have been dragged all the way over here. No wonder her legs are gone. They’re probably somewhere on the road between the video-store and the school.

She’s hissing through her broken teeth, digging her fingers into Stiles’s leg as she crawls higher, and Stiles doesn’t know what to do, has barely the time to think _that’s it, that’s the way I die, eaten by a zombie, at least it’s better than turning into one_. There’s the bursting sound of a gun being shot, and the girl collapses, her face inches away from Stiles’s stomach.

Stiles stares. He stares until Derek pushes the dead zombie aside and helps him get back on his feet. Then he has to hold on to Derek’s arm because he’s pretty sure otherwise his legs are going to give out under him. Derek allows him to, even slides his other arm around Stiles’s waist to help him stay upright.

“Where did you even get a gun?” Stiles manages to ask after a while. It’s stupid, it doesn’t matter, all that matters is the Derek put a bullet in the girl’s brains and saved his life, _again_ , but Stiles’s mouth has a habit of working on its own.

“Chris Argent,” Derek says, matter-of-factly, and wow, Stiles had no idea the truce between Allison’s dad and the werewolves was strong enough for Mr. Argent to be lending guns to Derek. “Where did she...?” he asks then, almost softly.

Stiles shuffles in Derek’s grip and holds out his arm. He tries to look at it, but it makes him feel nauseated again, so instead he drops his forehead down on Derek’s shoulder. It’s strong and reassuring, safe in a way he hasn’t often dared associate with the werewolf.

“What’s gonna happen to me?” Stiles asks, barely a whisper against the leather of Derek’s jacket.

“The fever will come first, then the shaking. You’ll start craving meat even as you grow weaker. Then the fever will boil your brain and your bodily functions will stop. And you’ll become like her.”

“Sure, no need to sugar-coat it!” Stiles whines, still not moving.

“There’s...an alternative,” Derek says, and Stiles’s head snaps up instantly, leaving him staring into Derek’s blue-green eyes.

“I’m all ears,” he breathes out when Derek doesn’t continue.

“Werewolves can’t get infected. Our... _nature_ is stronger theirs.”

Stiles keeps staring at Derek’s serious face, so close to it. Derek is offering him the bite. Peter had done it too, and Stiles had refused, but the circumstances now are different. It’s life or death. Well, it’s life or undeath, actually, which is even worse. Plus, Derek isn’t like his uncle. He’s not going to try and turn him into a murderer, he’ll help out with the full moon, and even if he doesn’t, there’s Scott.

“Will I be part of your pack?” he asks, even though he’s already made up his mind.

“If you want to, yes. If you don’t, you’ll be an omega, like Scott. But we’re stronger together. You would make a good pack member Stiles.”

Stiles nods, slowly. He can’t read the expression on Derek’s face, but Derek leads him to the other side of the jeep and opens the passenger door. Stiles should protest at the way Derek lifts him up to get him seated, his legs dangling out of the car, but he’s too tired and still a bit too scared to say anything.

He’s not _that_ tired that he’ll let Derek take off his shirt though.

“Wow, wow, it’s not that I’m against the idea of making out, but we kind of have more pressing matters!” he exclaims.

Derek raises an eyebrow at him, the corner of his lips turned up in what might be the hint of an amused but slightly surprised smile, and Stiles realises he just basically said he wouldn’t mind making out with Derek. Which, apparently, isn’t what the shirtlessness is about.

“The bite has a stronger chance to take when it’s done on the stomach,” Derek explains, and yes, that’s definitely a note of amusement in his voice. 

Bastard.

Stiles sighs and takes off his shirt, grateful that it’s summer and the night air is warm. Derek bends over Stiles, nudging his legs apart to fit between them, and Stiles’s heart starts racing again, mostly in fear of the pain that’s about to come. Mostly.

“We can always make out when your life’s not in danger anymore,” Derek says, looking up at Stiles’s face with that wicked grin Stiles has seen on him only a couple of times. It had scared him, these other times. Right now, it steals the breath away from him.

Derek’s face shifts and he lowers his eyes back at Stiles’s stomach, and yup, that’s the fear kicking back in despite Derek’s hand on his waist. Derek’s clawed hand. Stiles grabs Derek’s shoulder for support, because he’s feeling kind of dizzy, hormones and adrenaline flooding his system. Also, he might have forgotten to take his Adderall tonight.

“If...If this doesn’t work,” Stiles mumbles, “just put a bullet in my brain before I can hurt anyone, okay?”

Derek nods, then lowers his head. Sharp teeth pierce Stiles’s flesh, and it hurts, it hurts so much more than when the zombie bit his arm. 

Stiles screams into the night.


End file.
